


Protection

by thecat_13145



Category: The OC
Genre: Child Abuse, Childhood Sexual Abuse, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-16
Updated: 2012-09-16
Packaged: 2017-11-14 09:03:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/513560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thecat_13145/pseuds/thecat_13145
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sandy had sworn to her that he’d never touch Seth, and she tells herself that she believes him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Protection

**Author's Note:**

> O.K. I feel horrible for even having thought this, let alone writing it, but it wouldn't leave me alone.  
> I will state firmly that nothing happens and I don't believe anything would, but...
> 
> I own nothing and I normally don't write stuff like this so please don't sue.

Sandy had sworn to her that he’d never touch Seth, and she tells herself that she believes him.

That there’s a part of her that doesn’t panic every time she leaves them alone together. That hasn’t read everything she can find online about the symptoms of abuse, and watches her son for the slightest sign of them.

She’s a mother. She wants to protect her son.

But should that be at the expense of someone else’s?

She worried about his work as a public defender since it started.

About the young men, boys really, desperate to avoid juvie, ignorant of the law, of their rights, willing to do anything to stop it. 

Or about those who are grateful, and can read her husband enough to know exactly what sort of gratitude he’d like.

Or worse if one of them made an accusation. And she’d never be able to be certain if it was a truth or a lie.

She thought she’d thought of everything, but somehow she never considered this.

This kid with dirty blond hair and one black eye sitting in her living room, unable to look at her out of...What? Guilt for sleeping with her husband? Fear of what she’s going to do? Or just a reaction to what’s already being done?

“I was this kid”

She wants to ask if that makes him Fell Beaton, the man Sandy’s told her about. The attorney who saved and dammed Sandy in the same breath. 

“What this is just a scam, what if he’s casing the joint?”

The man who abused a mixed up kid’s trust.

Sandy looks at her like he’s shocked she can even think that. Like he hasn’t being honest with her about his…desires. About the dreams of boys barely out of their teens, of touching them, kissing them, telling them to do things, doing things to them. About the pictures.

She feels sick, she can’t look at this kid, Ryan, and she can’t look at her husband. She forces her disgust, her fear into anger, into action, demanding Sandy take the kid to social.

She’s not naïve enough to think that what’s she afraid of here, isn’t a risk there, but it has to better than this. A scared trust, possible the first one this kid has given betrayed.

She’s a mother, she wants to protect her son, but she won’t do it at the expense of someone else’s.

A tiny part of her brain wonders if Sandy could have paid the woman to disappear, making Ryan more vulnerable, forcing him into Sandy’s arms, but she dismisses it immediately. Her husband is screwed up, maybe even sick, but he’s not evil.

“He’s a kid.” She can hear in Sandy’s voice that he’s trying to reassure her. To say that he isn’t looking at this kid like that and maybe it’s the truth.

Or maybe it’s part of the truth and this is like a test for Sandy. Proof that he’s not going to act upon these desires. That Fell Beaton didn’t have to.

“Tomorrow.”

She’s a mother, but she’s also a wife who loves her husband. Who wants him to be happy.  
“First thing tomorrow.” She says, avoiding looking in Ryan’s direction.


End file.
